A New Yorker artist, the editors of Esquire and Time, a novelist and playwright, and the founding editor of ESPN the Magazine walk into a bar -- no, make that a French restaurant. It starts out as the setup for a joke, but the reality was deadly serious, at least to the men coming together. Long before these men reached such heights in their careers, they were united in their love for baseball.

And, in 1980, they were a part of the first fantasy baseball league.

Today, fantasy sports is undergoing yet another evolution: The rise of daily fantasy games has compressed the life cycle of an entire fantasy season into a single day. Sites like DraftKings and FanDuel let fans start with a fresh slate every day, picking brand-new players and pitting their fantasy lineups against friends, even strangers -- often with money on the line.

In the early 1980s, though, no one referred to this game as "fantasy." To Glen Waggoner, "it was real life." The game was called Rotisserie baseball, named after the French restaurant in New York City where the game got its start. It used a scoring method devised by Daniel Okrent, who invented the system on a flight down from New England to Texas.

The game was simple and ingenious: Participating players would draft their own teams, acting as general managers. Scoring would be done by using the statistics provided in newspaper box scores.

Today, of course, this game is familiar to more than 10 million people around the world who participate in online fantasy baseball leagues. Even more play fantasy basketball and football, the latter of which has become the most popular of all fantasy sports. The rules of today's fantasy baseball are strikingly similar to how it was conducted in the early 1980s, when this group of friends in New York City developed a passion for the game.

And yet, despite the similarities of today's game, it remains strikingly different.

"I would spend three to five hours a day working on it, trying to work out trades and everything," says Waggoner, who at the time was a mid-level administrator at Columbia University. He split the $250 entry fee to co-manage a team with the writer Peter Gethers (left, in photo above with Okrent).

"Peter and I had done a ton of work ranking every player in the National League by position," Waggoner says. "We wanted to be in a good position to get good guys.

"I was trying to put up a brave front, but I was kind of lost."

Waggoner ended up winning that inaugural season, and the game's participants kept at it. The game's popularity slowly started to spread beyond that initial group of people. In 1982, Waggoner taught the game to some undergraduates at Columbia who had heard about the game and were interested in playing themselves. Those undergraduates founded the Roach Motel League, named after a less-than-attractive campus dormitory. Today, it stands at the oldest continuous fantasy sports league in the world.

What made Rotisserie baseball so popular was its grounding solidly in the present -- and, through that, the wrinkle of team owners operating as general managers. Before the 1980s, there were precursors to fantasy sports that used statistics from past seasons to allow for the simulation of games. Rotisserie baseball was totally different in this one regard: It functioned with a similar format but used real-time scoring to decide who won.

Team owners, then, had to make decisions with the future in mind, based on the information at hand -- no different from how baseball executives and managers made their own roster and lineup decisions. It required a more in-depth knowledge of the game, offered unreliable results, and created a new way for baseball fans to find meaning and rooting interest in almost any Major League Baseball game.

"The idea of owning a New York Met here, an Atlanta Brave there, a Pittsburgh Pirate -- it was terrific," Waggoner says. Thirty-five years later, he still remembers the critical choices that lifted his team to victory, but not before other decisions jeopardized success.

"We paid a ton of money for Dave Kingman, who was a washout," Waggoner says. "The key to our success was [New York Mets pitcher] Neil Allen."

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Original members of the Rotisserie League don't see much in common between their original league and fantasy sports of today. Waggoner understands that his league spawned a virtual sport now played by tens of millions of people, but to him, the online version of the game -- which he doesn't fully understand, out of indifference -- lacks many of the romantic qualities that made Rotisserie League baseball so great.

For one, Waggoner is appalled by the lukewarm approach many participants take toward managing their teams. For him, the fun was always the strategy, the crazed time investment into the game. When told that some people passively participate by taking a few minutes every week to set their lineups, he scoffs. "I was spending three to five hours a day working on trades. If it's three to five minutes, yes indeed, that's a different experience."

Waggoner sees the game's online iteration as a more distant approach to playing -- participants don't have to engage as deeply with box scores, and the game results are not as intimately known.

If nothing else, the extreme nature of the Rotisserie League is rarely matched by contemporary leagues: Waggoner recalls how his secretary at Columbia would draw the game results from the box scores in the newspaper. When Okrent published the instructional book, "Rotisserie League Baseball," in 1984, the book was dedicated to Waggoner's secretary, Sandy.

Upon its publication, Okrent's book served as the Bible for fantasy baseball -- although no one was calling it by that generic term at the time. In fact, the term "fantasy" came about simply as an alternative to "Rotisserie" -- a way for firms monetizing this new form of gaming to cut out Okrent, Waggoner and the rest of the group.

Waggoner says that while the group tried to maintain ownership of the game and cash in on its fast-rising success, the term "fantasy" was used to evade questions of ownership. While devoted fans of the baseball game did -- and still do -- recognize Rotisserie League Baseball as the genesis of today's fantasy game, the group didn't profit nearly as much as one might expect.

In a feature earlier this month from The New Yorker, Okrent estimates that none of the participants ever earned more than $10,000 to $15,000 from their association with the game. For a time in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Okrent, Waggoner and others would earn money from appearances at conventions dedicated to the game. But those opportunities quickly dissipated, and Okrent wasn't too enamored with them, anyway.

As the group turned into a cult figure in the history of fantasy sports, the men seemed to withdraw from the spotlight. Both Okrent and Waggoner were among the first people ever elected into the Fantasy Sports Hall of Fame in Orlando, Florida, and neither of them attended the induction ceremony.

Okrent tells The New Yorker: "You couldn't have paid me to go."

Waggoner says that the way fantasy sports took off without the Rotisserie group doesn't make him bitter. "We went into [Rotisserie baseball] for fun, not money, and we succeeded," he says. "We didn’t have any real idea of how to capture that flag and get in on the front end of that money slide.

"I blame Dan Okrent for that," he jokes. "It was his idea in the first place. We would have all been rich if he’d been able to figure it out."

At the same time, fantasy sports is a distant part of Waggoner's past. He hasn't played in a league in about 20 years as other conflicts and opportunities came up. One impressive feat of the Rotisserie League baseball is that it brought many accomplished young professionals together -- and, in several cases, helped them collaborate and further one another's careers.

Thanks to his involvement, and meeting Rotisserie member and then-Esquire editor Lee Eisenberg, Waggoner got out of academia and began writing. What followed was a long career as a journalist, capstoned by his run as the founding editor of ESPN the Magazine. Okrent served as an editor for a number of magazines, wrote a handful of books, and later served as the public editor for The New York Times.

Okrent more recently collaborated on a theater production with Gethers, the novelists who was Waggoner's co-owner. Bruce McCall, an artist often featured on covers of The New Yorker, played one season -- although, Waggoner teases, he wasn't very good at it.

So no, Waggoner doesn't have a bad view of his history with fantasy baseball. The game remains a fun chapter in his life -- but one that, for him, had to be left behind.

"I had other things going on, I was involved in writing and had less free time, and you kind of get [the enjoyment of the game], but it doesn’t mean that you’re going to do that same thing the rest of your life," Waggoner says. "But I had a great run, a great run. It transformed my life."

Fantasy Sports Network is the first TV channel dedicated exclusively to the coverage of fantasy sports. Launched in the spring, the channel has limited distribution in the United States and Canada. But it took a big step toward expanding its profile this week by bringing aboard Basketball Hall of Famer Julius Erving.

Through his company, Dr. J. Enterprises, Erving will serve as strategic adviser.

As the Philadelphia Inquirer put it, Erving's mission to help Fantasy Sports Network "gain coverage with video giants like Comcast, DirectTV and AT&T, and marketing partnerships with pro leagues and advertisers."

Fantasy Sports Network does not offer fantasy games. Rather, its mission is to serve the growing industry of fantasy sports by providing content and analysis.

The company's decision to add Erving speaks to the growth potential of basketball within fantasy sports. Baseball established roots early from the days when this sort of activity was known as rotisserie leagues. Football has since become the behemoth.

But particularly with more companies offering shorter-term options instead of having to play for an entire season, basketball become attractive becomes it has an inventory action. Each NFL team plays just 16 games while it's 82 for NBA clubs.

In fantasy football, winning sometimes means losing. There's nothing worse than having players pulled -- or worse, having your quarterback hand off the ball as his team runs out the clock -- when your fantasy team is in desperate need of points.

But how about losing on a victory formation kneel-down? Such a nightmare is reality for one unfortunate fan. TYT Sports tells the story.

An estimated 20 percent of participants in fantasy football are women, and that figure is likely to grow in the coming years. Football in general has been building a stronger female fan base the past decade, and fantasy in particular is often a chance for women to add another shared experience their significant other. Here's a closer look:

Dodgers ace Clayton Kershaw played a year of high school football while growing up in Texas, but decided after his freshman season to focus on baseball. Despite his strong arm, Kershaw was the center rather than quarterback, which wasn't a bungled coaching move since the team had Matthew Stafford taking the snaps.

Stafford, the No. 1 overall in the 2009 NFL draft, threw 41 touchdown passes for the Lions in 2011. But Kershaw said he wasn't going to burn an early-round draft pick in his fantasy football draft just to grab his old buddy from Highland Park High School in Dallas. Where would he take him? Check out his analysis:

Penalty calls have skyrocketed during the preseason, and one of the NFL's marquee players thinks the league has ulterior motives for the increase in flags.

Seattle Seahawks cornerback Richard Sherman, who has never been afraid to voice his opinion, says the NFL has fantasy football players in mind with new rules designed to reduce illegal contact by pass defenders and defensive holding in the secondary. Through two weeks of the preseason penalties were up 44 percent from last year.

In an interview with NBC’s Josh Elliott that aired on Sunday Night Football, Sherman ties the increase in penalties with the NFL's drive for money.

"When the fantasy football numbers need to be what they need to be, the league needs to do what it needs to do to get it done," Sherman says. "This is a money-driven league. Whatever sells the tickets is gonna sell the tickets.”

While the idea that the NFL would implement a set of rules to enhance fantasy football seems questionable, Sherman may be on to something here. The new regulations are expected to significantly benefit offenses, which will lead to higher scoring games and more interesting fantasy football matchups. So while the crackdown may not be specifically tied to fantasy football, the game and its players will surely be affected.

Sherman and the Seahawks' defensive backfield is coming off of one of the most dominating Super Bowl performances in history. The group, which calls itself the "Legion of Boom," shut down Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos' high powered offense in a 43-8 blowout.

Despite the belief that the new rules, which may make pass interference calls more common, are targeting defensive backs, Sherman says the level of penalties will return to normal by the time the season starts. With Aaron Rodgers, Philip Rivers and Peyton Manning on the docket for the Seahawks in the first three weeks of the season, Seahawks fans better hope their star cornerback is correct in his assumption.

The Manning Brothers hip-hop duo is back. As they did a year ago, Peyton and Eli Manning take the big YouTube stage with a DirecTV promo video. This year, the single is "Fantasy Football Fantasy."

This year's ad promotes DirecTV's new Fantasy Zone Channel, a channel devoted to fantasy football. While the Mannings donned wigs on Bourbon Street in 2013, this year's video features more of a gangster rap-style in front of an expensive house. Jets running back Chris Johnson, Hall of Fame quarterback Joe Namath and Giants offensive linemen Justin Pugh, William Beatty and Chris Snee (who has since retired) make cameos. Spoiler alert: So does Archie Manning.

Again, the world gets to experience another side of Peyton and Eli Manning. Aside from their on-field accolades–the duo has combined for five Super Bowl appearances and three titles–the quarterback brothers can have fun on screen. If this is an annual thing, no one will complain.

You already knew Jamaal Charles had a good day against the Oakland Raiders on Sunday. The Kansas City Chiefs star racked up more than 50 points thanks to four receiving touchdowns, 195 receiving yards and one rushing score.

But just how good was Charles' day, from a fantasy perspective?

According to ESPN's Tristan H. Cockcroft, Charles' monster performance put him in the top 10 for players since the NFL started using detailed box scores in 1960. Of course, back then there was not fantasy football, but point totals can be tallied by combing through box scores.

The top mark belongs to Gale Sayers, who scored six touchdowns (four receiving, one rushing and one on a punt return) in Week 13 of the 1965 season. Sayers, a rookie, would have scored 55 points for his fantasy owners that day.

Clinton Portis' five-touchdown, 218 yard performance against the Chiefs in Week 14 of the 2003 season is second followed by Jim Brown's 242 yard and four touchdown day on Week 10 of the 1961 season.

Making Charles' performance even more epic is that he did it in the fantasy playoffs, essentially willing his owners to victory. Grantland's Bill Barnwell notes Charles' game was the third best in the fantasy playoffs of the last 53 years.

Portis' game was also in the fantasy playoffs, as was Corey Dillon's four-touchdown, 246-yard performance in Week 15 of the 1997 season.

Of all the celebrities who would be fantasy football junkies, Daniel Radcliffe doesn't seem like he'd be at the top of the list.

Nothing against Radcliffe, who starred as Harry Potter in all eight Harry Potter films, but he doesn't exactly fit the profile of a huge NFL fan. He was born in England and is not one of those celebrities (think Ashton Kutcher or LeBron James) who seems to be always popping up on the sidelines of NFL games.

So we were quite surprised when, in an interview with the New York Times, Radcliffe professed his love for fantasy football. And he's not just your average "I-check-my-league-once-a-week" player, he is a non-stop gamer who has even named his team after Barkevious Mingo's mother.

Radcliffe told the New York Times that he probably knows the name of ever starter in the NFL, and he says he reserves his Sundays strictly for football. And as for his team name, well, like the rest of the country he is enamored with one Cleveland Browns rookie.

"Um, my team name is Barkevious Mingo’s Mum,"Radcliffe says. "I just think Barkevious Mingo is the greatest name I’ve ever heard, and the fact that his mum invented that name is also amazing. And in that league I have the Cleveland defense as well, and they had an amazing game the other day against Buffalo, so I’m incredibly grateful to the Cleveland defense, Barkevious Mingo and his mother."

Radcliffe says he has an easier time being an objective fantasy football player because he has no natural NFL loyalty. Still, he has become a huge New York Giants fan, to the point where he has perhaps a little too much confidence in his team. Last week he told the New York Times that he still thinks the winless Giants have a chance to make the playoffs.